As I write this Luke is sleeping after a long morning at the hospital beginning at 7am. Luke was scheduled to have a hydocele repair and circumcision. Everything went well getting ready for surgery. Luke and I played with his Barney computer and watched cartoons. He was very quiet and cute as I signed my name over and over and repeated his name and birthday at least five times to different people. He watched as other carts lined up in the pre-surgery room with people of all ages prepped and ready to go. We talked to one nurse with two daughters from China who is getting ready to go get her new 2.5 year old son from China. We met a doctor who is the father of Sarah, a little girl at Luke's daycare. I had never met him, had only talked to the mother, but he recognized Luke and came over to introduce himself.
The surgery only took around 40 minutes. The doctor said that there was quite a bit of infection under his foreskin so I was glad we made the decision to have him circumcised at this time. The doctor told us what to expect and to bring him in to his office in 10 days to have the butterfly bandages removed from his tiny belly incision from the hydrocele repair.
They let us know that Luke had been returned to his room and as we walked down the hall I could hear a child crying. I hoped it was not him, but it was and he was crying very loudly. The nurses assured us that he was in no pain, that this was a typical responce from children coming out of anestigia. Luke cried a sad cry and I was able to hold him but it did not stop the crying. He kept looking at his arm all bandaged up with an IV and this seemed to distress him. The nurse came in and took the IV out and that seemed to quiet him down some. They also brought him a Popsicle and that also helped. Shortly after Luke decided enough was enough and he broke out into an angry tantrum. He was yelling very loud and kicking and obviously very mad. He kept repeating one phrase over and over and John is still trying to figure out what is was as he feels it was in Chinese. Evidently, according to our exchange student, Luke knows some pretty "bad" words in Chinese. I can only imagine what he was shouting. This went on for over an hour. They moved the other patient out of our room and closed out door. The nurse asked if Luke had gone to the bathroom and so I took him in. He sat on the potty and would not let me help him. Somehow, just sitting there all propped up by himself made him stop shouting. We were able to get his pjs back on and get the heck out of the hospital. We made it home by noon. Now I remember how I have felt after the many surgeries I have had and let me tell you, it was not the way that Luke appears to feel. He has been running around dancing and laughing. This kid is on codeine and can still stay awake and dance. He ate a small amount of food and drank some juice and finally crashed a little after 2. After the struggles we had in the hospital just restraining him to keep him from running out the door, I was tired too! He is choosing not to wear any pants or underwear at this point and walks kind of like an old man, all hunched forward. He quickly showed Ba Ba his new penis and he has studied it carefully. I'm sure the rest of the family is going to be just thrilled with his state of dress at the dinner table. The nurse warned me that kids react differently. She said some want the area completely covered and don't want anyone to touch them and others just want to let it all hang out. I guess Luke falls into the second category. The pictures are of Luke "before" surgery when he was still happy. I did not take any pictures of him in his state of rage. It was all John and I could do to both keep him restrained. While all this was going on, the man sitting with the patient in the next bed over came over to show us his picture of his FOUR adopted daughters from China. He had heard our conversation with the nurse and wanted to say hi. And to think we only have TWO kids from China.
